Browsing and Selecting Items in Recovery Storage Groups to Perform Recovery Onto Production Server

1. In a distributed network comprising a production server and a backup storage location, the production server employing a recovery storage group for performing data recovery operations, a method for performing data recovery of individual data objects, the method comprising: recovering a backup database from a backup storage location into a recovered database in a recovery storage group at the production server; accessing the recovery storage group containing the recovered database that has been recovered from the backup database stored in the backup storage location; parsing the data located in the recovered database into separate data objects to identify each individual data object residing in the recovered database; displaying on a graphical user interface the individual data objects residing in the recovered database; receiving a selection of one or more of the individual data objects via the graphical user interface; and restoring the one or more selected data objects from the recovered database to one or more storage locations on the production server.

2. The method as recited in claim 1 , wherein recovering a backup database from a backup storage location into a recovered database further comprises: copying the backed up database from the backup storage location to the recovery storage group located on the production server, the backed up database containing a copy of a database originally located on the production server.

3. The method as recited in claim 1 , wherein displaying on a graphical user interface the individual data objects residing in the recovered database further comprises displaying a hierarchical structure of the individual data objects.

4. The method as recited in claim 3 , wherein the graphical user interface is further configured to receive a selection of one or more groups of the individual data objects in accordance with the hierarchical structure.

5. The method as recited in claim 1 , wherein the production server is a mail exchange production server, and wherein the recovered database is a recovered exchange database containing a backup copy of an exchange database residing on the mail exchange production server, the recovered exchange database containing mail data objects for one or more users.

6. The method as recited in claim 5 , wherein identifying each individual data object residing in the recovered database further comprises: utilizing an application programming interface configured for parsing data on the recovered exchange database into individual data objects.

7. The method as recited in claim 6 , wherein the application programming interface is compliant with a Messaging Application Programming Interface (MAPI) architecture.

8. The method as recited in claim 5 , wherein the data objects residing in the recovered database include at least one of users, folders, electronic mail items, calendar entries, contact data, journal entries, notes, and tasks.

9. In a distributed network comprising a mail exchange production server and a backup storage location, the mail exchange production server employing a recovery storage group for performing data recovery operations, a method for performing data recovery of individual data objects, the method comprising: recovering a backup exchange database into a recovered exchange database; copying the recovered exchange database from a backup storage location to a recovery storage group residing on a mail exchange production server, the recovered exchange database comprising a backup copy of an exchange database residing on the mail exchange production server, the recovery storage group requiring that at least a group of data objects residing in the recovered exchange database be recovered during a recovery operation; parsing the recovered exchange database into separate data objects to identify each individual data object residing in the recovered exchange database, the data objects including mail data for one or more users of the mail exchange production server; displaying the individual data objects on a graphical user interface; receiving a selection of one or more of the individual data objects from via the graphical user interface; and restoring the one or more selected data objects from the recovered exchange database to the exchange database residing on the mail exchange production server.

10. The method as recited in claim 9 , wherein identifying each data object residing in the identified database further comprises: utilizing a Messaging Application Programming Interface (MAPI) configured for parsing and identifying individual data objects in the recovered exchange database.

11. The method as recited in claim 9 , wherein the data objects residing in the recovered database include at least one of folders, electronic mail items, users, calendar entries, contact data, journal entries, notes, and tasks.

12. The method as recited in claim 9 , wherein displaying the individual data objects on a graphical user interface further comprises displaying a hierarchical structure of the individual data objects.

13. The method as recited in claim 12 , wherein the graphical user interface is further configured to receive a selection of one or more groups of the individual data objects in accordance with the hierarchical structure.

14. In a distributed network comprising a production server, a backup storage server, and a recovery interface, the production server employing a recovery storage group for performing data recovery operations, a computer program product configured to implement a method of performing data recovery of individual data objects, the computer program product comprising one or more tangible computer readable media having stored thereon computer executable instructions that, when executed by a processor, causes the recovery interface to perform the following: recover a recovered database from a backup storage into a production server, wherein the recovered database is stored in a recovery storage group; access the recovery storage group containing the recovered database that has been recovered from a backup storage server into the production server, the recovery storage group requiring that at least a group of data objects residing in the recovered database be recovered during a recovery operation; parse the recovered database to identify each individual data object residing in the recovered database; displaying a graphical user interface that allows a user to access and select the individual data objects from the recovered database; receive a selection of one or more of the individual data objects via the graphical user interface; and restore the one or more selected data objects to a storage location on the production server.

15. The computer program product as recited in claim 14 , wherein the computer executable instructions that cause the recovery interface to display on a graphical user interface the individual data objects from the recovered database further comprise instructions to cause the graphical user interface to display a hierarchical structure of the individual data objects.

16. The computer program product as recited in claim 14 , wherein the recovery interface is installed on the production server.

17. The computer program product as recited in claim 14 , wherein the production server is a mail exchange production server, and wherein the recovered database is a recovered exchange database containing a backup copy of an exchange database residing on the mail exchange production server, the recovered exchange database containing mail data objects for one or more users.

18. The computer program product as recited in claim 17 , wherein the computer executable instructions that cause the recovery interface to identify each individual data object residing in the recovered database further comprise instructions to cause the recovery interface to perform the following: utilize an application programming interface configured for parsing into an exchange database and identifying the individual data objects.

19. The computer program product as recited in claim 18 , wherein the application programming interface is compliant with a Messaging Application Programming Interface (MAPI) architecture.

20. The computer program product as recited in claim 17 , wherein the data objects residing in the recovered database include at least one of users, folders, electronic mail items, calendar entries, contact data, journal entries, notes, and tasks.